An Interview With Alan Hart
So while I don’t have any sympathy for Zionism because, in action, it’s a monster, as anti-Zionist Jews always feared it would be, I do understand, and invite readers to understand, where it comes from. In much the same way as I understand, and invite readers to understand, where the monster of violent Moslem fundamentalism comes from.
How will you respond to the accusation, if it’s made, that you and your book are anti-Semitic?
Nobody of sound mind could read my book and make such an accusation. This book is the opposite of anti-Semitic. Stripped down to its absolute essence, it’s the call of a concerned and caring goy, me, for the Jews to become the light unto nations, not least because the rest of us need them to be. If such an accusation is made, it will be politically motivated, malicious and for the purpose of smearing author and book, in the expectation that people will prove that they are not anti-Semitic by not buying the book. The very last thing that anybody who accuses me of anti-Semitism will want is informed and honest debate of the kind the book was written to make possible.
And I don’t mind anybody knowing what I’ll do if I am accused of anti-Semitism. I’ll demand a retraction with an apology. And if I do not receive satisfaction on that account, I will sue. (There is available with the Press Release a feature article I have written, THE MONSTER OF ANTI-SEMITISM – HOW TO DESTROY IT. In advance of the book itself, it highlights the difference between Judaism and Zionism and therefore why it is perfectly possible to be passionately anti-Zionist without being in any way, shape or form anti-Semitic; and without being anti-Israel as a state for some Jews inside its borders as they were on the eve of the 1967 war, with Jerusalem an open City and the capital of two states, Israel and Palestine).
In the Prologue you say you are aware that “much of this book could cause pain and possibly distress to very many Jews.”
It could not be otherwise because I am asking diaspora Jews, and the rational half (more or less) of Israeli Jews, to consider the proposition that almost everything they have been conditioned to believe about what has kept the conflict going is part and parcel of one big Zionist propaganda lie – a lie effectively endorsed by the political establishments of the Judeo-Christian world and, more by default than design, by the mainstream media. Even more troubling for mainstream Jewish readers (i.e. not those who’ve always been opposed to Zionism and even the existence of a state for Jews) is that, through the words of some very courageous Jews, the book is asking them to recognise that their silence on the matter of Israel’s behaviour is, effectively, “complicity” in Zionism’s crimes and its preference for land without peace; and that they are standing idly by while Zionism demolishes the moral foundations of Judaism.
When I put the complicity point to a Jewish Englishman who is a member of group which is committed to a genuine two-state solution based on an acceptable minimum of justice for the Palestinians, he said to me: “In principle the complicity point is a fair one, but Jews can’t actually be complicit if they are unaware that Zionism’s version of history is a propaganda lie.” I replied: “That, too, is a fair point. But they will be complicit if, knowing the truth, they remain silent.”
But also in the Prologue I tell all readers that I do, in fact, work my way to an uplifting conclusion, one that should be a source of comfort, hope and inspiration for Jewish readers especially. This is my way of signalling my belief, set down in the Epilogue, that the Jews are still uniquely placed to be the Light Unto Nations.
Is there comfort for Arabs in your book?
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